Vogue
by A. J. Flint
Summary: The perfect grades, the perfect body—Yurina Watanabe's practically got it all. Or does she? A choice from her past haunts her present as a seemingly random kidnapping thrusts her future into the underground life of the Spirit Detectives and lost love.
1. Chapter 1

"Vogue"  
By A.J. Flint

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Chapter 1

My lie has been my life, from the first start to each and every finish.

A Star student, model citizen, outstanding morals, and exceptional compassion—some even say I have an almost frighteningly gorgeous face. What some would consider a burden is what I make a living off of. I'm a model for one of the biggest agencies in the world—Feel Good Management. I've traveled across Earth, visited six of the seven continents, posed with famous models like Jessica Sommora and Rick Ferrante, and managed to keep a 3.7 GPA all the while. A blonde bombshell with a heart of gold and grades to prove it, that's me, the Lily of Japan...

At least, that is what this incarnation is.

I wish that I could say my name and feel like that young woman on the verge of taking the first scary step into a great career is really me, but I can't.

"Yurina Watanabe…" I whisper softly, a silent hope while brushing one of my long blonde hairs out of my eyes. It wouldn't take much to call up a torrent of tears, but tears will do me no good in a situation like this. Hell, they hardly even help me when I pose in for a spread or do my walk down that long fashion runway.

The choices I made in the past, oh how I wish I could take them back. I was young, so young, to make such a big decision. It seems so stupid now, in this dark, damp cell under hundreds of pounds of earth, to have chosen demonic intervention over the mortal, human existence.

I should have known that the Demon who offered me the deal had something up her sleeve. Eternal demonic life in exchange for one mortal existence? God—now the choice seems so juvenile. If I had known then what I know now, I never would have agreed to the exchange.

My super hearing picks up the soft tapping of the rain against the soil outside the sullen chamber while the thunderous pounding of the otherworldly guards two floors up makes my heart race. If only someone knew I was here…

The commotion from upstairs only grows louder as time passes. The tears welling up behind my eyes, I pull my knees into my chest, leaning against the roughly hewn corner. There is no doubt that they are deciding on the best way to roast me alive.

"I wouldn't eat me," I reassure myself unconfidently. "There's no meat on your bones. They'd have to fatten you up, Yurina. And even then, you've still got a lifetime worth of lives yet to live, and the pain would only last ten minutes, twenty tops.."

The noises reach an all-time high as the tears spill over and roll down my cheeks. I hate dying. Each time I do is more painful than the one before. The pitter patter of the rain outside grows louder as well, a crescendo of sound that culminated with one final bought of thunder and lightning before all goes quiet in the castle around me. Death is imminent.

A rush of footsteps down the stairs at the end of the long corridor outside my cell is the impending sentence that sends me to the stomachs of my captors.

"Yurina?" A gruff voice pants while pounding at the old, wooden door separating me from the brutes outside.

"If your want to eat me," I shout weakly, burying my head in my knees, "I won't taste good, so just let me go."

"Yurina, stay away from the door, okay? I'm going to break it down so I can get you out!"

What is he talking about?

That definitely doesn't sound like the ghouls who kidnapped me from my apartment a few days ago. The owner of the voice actually sounds like he cares about my wellbeing where all the demons wanted were my flesh and the secret to my eternal life of the damned.

"Ok-kay." I stutter, pressing myself against the wall a little harder, and covering my face with my hands.

The door explodes in a giant flash of blue light, shards of wood flying everywhere. Coughing, I stand up, squinting to see my rescuer.

A boy, no older than myself stands outside where the door used to be, panting with a small smirk. "They said you were pretty."

"Excuse me?" I ask, my eyebrows shooting up and my eyes immediately crossing over my chest. I almost lose my balance, but my model training catches the irregularity in my footing before I fall.

He runs a hand through his slicked back black hair and laughs, "The demons upstairs, toots. They really seemed to like you."

He steps in and smiles, flashing a victory sign before offering his hand to me. "Come on, don't tell me you want to stay here."

"Why should I trust you?" I ask, never losing that cool façade that I've been trained to wear in public.

He laughs. "'Cause I'm Yusuke Urameshi, the toughest kid at Sarayashiki Junior High." He leans over and grabs my arm, "Once you get to know me, I think you'll find out that I'm a pretty decent guy."

"I've met many so called decent guys, Mr. Urameshi—what makes you so different?" I ask, pulling my ripped shirt down to cover my bruised stomach.

He looks at me for a second and starts to lead me towards the stairs before responding sarcastically, "How many decent guys have saved you from the drooling mouths of trolls goblins before?"

I smile softly. "Not many, I'll admit."

And as we walk quietly through the ruins of the castle mixed in with the burning flesh of the clan of the demons who inhabited it, he smirks, barely hiding the fact that his lip is curling at the foulness of it all. "And that, Miss Watanabe, is exactly my point."

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_Please review! I need all the feedback and constructive criticism I can get.  
_

_ lessthanthree, AJ. _


	2. Chapter 2

**  
**

"Vogue"  
By A.J. Flint

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Chapter 2

Not having a mirror for three days seems like a blessing as I peer at my reflection through squinted eyes. The girl that looks back at me hardly seems even close to what I'm used to. Her blonde hair is matted with blood and bile, her skin greasy and littered with huge welts and bruises, and the cut on her cheek is well on its way to becoming a nice, infected accessory to the giant, indigo shiner around her left eye.

"Somewhere under all this mess," I sigh, picking up the bar of soap and hand towel, "is the beautiful girl that half the boys in Japan drool over on a daily basis."

Tossing my hair over my shoulder, I cringe pressing the wet washcloth against the cut on my face. Tears find their way to my eyes again, and they mix with blood as they run down my cheek, cutting tracks through the caked on muck. The soap stings terribly, but it must be done. I can't have a scar on my cheek. It would ruin the entirely flawless complexion I have worked so hard to maintain over the years. I run the washcloth over the rest of my face, trying in vain to scrub and exfoliate the rest of the dirt out of their relentless stronghold on my perfect pores.

Throwing the washcloth into the sink, I scream while pulling on my hair. I need a bath, not a momentary powder trip in a dingy bathroom in the middle of nowhere. I need a new outfit, not the jacket of my would-be rescuer.

A rapping knock on the thin door interrupts my bought of helplessness, "Yurina? Are you okay?"

I stare at the door, confused as the tears momentarily stop in their well-worn tracks.

"Oh, God! You haven't been kidnapped again, have you!?" The rusty door handle jiggles as Yusuke makes a halfhearted attempt at breaking in to the rustic bathroom. "That would really be annoying—" he knocks again, harder this time, "—Yurina!"

My voice cracks as I stand up. "I'm-I'm still here."

The door handle stops clicking, and the fact that the lock stayed in place is amazing.

"Well, hurry it up. I've got a deadline with the Baby."

Picking up the washcloth I do my best at cleaning the grime off my cheeks, though I can't really tell the difference. Turning the lock over, I open the door and step outside. The mud beneath my feet makes a sickening slosh of a noise under my open toe sandals. Setting my teeth, I grimace to keep from biting my horrendously chapped lips, and it takes me a second to realize that Yusuke is leaning against the decrepit shack, muscular arms crossed with a toothpick hanging out of his mouth all while staring at me in what I consider in quite an intuitive fashion.

"Deadline?" I ask, pulling my matted hair back with a piece of ribbon from my completely ruined shirt. That was brand new piece from one of Tokyo's hottest designers too. A tragic death for the fashion world.

"Our ride should be here any minute," he frowns looking towards the sky. "I'm not surprised that she's late."

"Who?" I ask, becoming slightly frustrated with the enigmas that are his answers. All of a sudden a flash of light from the sky, a woman dressed in an old-fashioned, cherry blossom pink kimono zooms towards the ground and smiles radiantly as she descends.

I press my hands against my mouth to keep from screaming as she screeches to a halt only a few feet above the ground. A long stick in her hand, she laughs giddily and rushes up to Yusuke, joyfully throwing a hug on him.

"Oh, Yusuke! You survived!"

"Erm—Botan!" Yusuke said, peeling the girl off of him. Her blue hair makes me cringe—no girl in her right mind of take the chance of bleaching her hair and then dye it to such a color. Such a gamble I would never, ever make with my golden locks. Blah. But I do admit that it sort of fits her out of the ordinary entrance.

"You're both alright then?" She asks, brushing off her kimono before turning to me. As she takes in my rag tag appearance, her face contorts into quite a mix of concern and what I interpret as sisterly instinct and she launches herself at me with a clean handkerchief. "Oh, your beautiful face! Does it hurt?"

I dodge her attack, throwing up my hands in surrender, "Really I'm fine. All I want to do is go home and sleep for a week and a half."

"Are you sure?" She whines, trying to assess my black eye.

"Aw, Botan, leave her alone. She's been locked in a dungeon with trolls for the past couple of days, geeze." Yusuke scowls, throwing his toothpick on the ground.

Botan smiles and takes a quick breath, "Right, well. I'm Botan." She waves quickly. "And you're… Yurina, right?"

I nod, "Yurina Watanabe. Pleasure I'm sure."

"Bingo, exactly. Now." She claps her hands and out of the corner my eyes I see Yusuke roll his own. "We'll be off, I suppose. So gather round, take a piece of oar, and we'll get out of this musty old forest."

Yusuke puts his hand on Botan's shoulder and motions for me to follow his lead..

Timidly I step forward and for a moment forget the insanity of this whole thing. Blindly, I reach for Yusuke's hand and intertwine my fingers with his. He looks at me again, this time, something in his eyes that I can't understand. An emotion, an emotion foreign to me…What is it?

All of a sudden, we're off, soaring through the sky, towards the moon and the atmosphere presses against my body and making me feel like self implosion is imminent. The external pressure builds and builds, and I cling to Yusuke's arm harder, as if it's my last chance at survival of this life.

I bury my head in his shoulder, nestled in my blonde waves and choking back the sobs of terror, when at last there is a giant pop in the air an the pressure around us dissipates. My feet hit grass, and my legs collapse under me.

"Oh god…" I whisper, grasping at the grass with my free hand in a vain attempt to stabilize myself.

"Yurina?" Yusuke says, and I can't tell if it's amusement or worry in his voice. "You alright?"

"What… What just happened? Are we in outer space or something?" I gasp, pulling myself to my feet.

Botan laughs, "In a way! We're in the Spirit World silly! Haven't you ever been?"

Giving her a weak smile, I shake my head no. _Always the demon plane…_I say to myself.

"Oh goodness!" She giggles, her blue curls flailing against her shoulders. "I guess that it would make you little weak in the knees if it's your first time here. Now, there is no time to waste!" She grins radiantly, and points towards the castle behind us. "Koenma wants to see you, my dear, and he's not a very patient man."

She gives me a little push on the shoulders towards the palace, and it's only then that I realize I'm still holding tightly on to Yusuke's hand. Pulling away, I feel a soft blush creep into my cheeks. "Sorry Yusuke," I mutter, a moment of sheer stupidity somehow entering my body.

He shruggs, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his green trousers and falling into step behind Botan, leaving me no other choice but to fall into step behind him in the small game of follow-the-leader we have started.

_Spirit World, eh… _I tuck a piece of flyaway hair behind my ear and sigh quietly. Staring at Yusuke's back, I lose all trains of thought and my mind blanks, until one lone locomotive of a notion enters my head and a smile graces my swollen, broken lips for the first time in days...

_Maybe he isn't that bad of a guy after all…_

* * *

_Please review! I need all the feedback and constructive criticism I can get.  
_

_ lessthanthree, AJ. _


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